Two very different diamond rings are the focus of artworks currently being discussed in the art world and beyond - Blue Diamond, a sculpture by postmodernist Jeff Koons, and Marine Wedding, a photograph by Nina Berman. The artworks are poles apart, but each illustrates in its own way the crisis American society has fallen into. The works also exemplify the contrasting directions American art is taking in the face of that crisis.

Blue Diamond is a giant, highly polished stainless steel sculpture that’s nearly eight feet tall and more than seven feet wide. The replica jewel will be sold Nov. 13 at Christie’s auction of postwar and contemporary art, and it’s expected to sell for as high as $12 million. Christie’s described the work as “an almost comic-strip archetype, a stereotype, a cliché that has burst into monumental existence in our world, speaking of wealth and luxury and awe in an open, sincere and deliberately uncritical manner.” In other words, Blue Diamond is a crass celebration of ostentatious wealth that carries the moral authority and profundity of a Hallmark greeting card.

In contrast to the vapid kitsch offered by Koons, photographer Nina Berman puts forward a humanist vision that is at once heartrending and busting with empathy. In her photo, Marine Wedding, a diamond wedding ring is obscured by a beautiful bridal bouquet - and an unsettling vision of America’s war in Iraq. In 2004, Marine Corps reservist Ty Ziegal was trapped in a burning truck after it came under attack by Iraqi guerillas, that he survived was a miracle, but 19 rounds of reconstructive surgery could not restore the face stolen by war. The wedding day portrait of Renee Kline, 21, and Ty Ziegal, 24, has launched an eternal discussion on the meaning of love, devotion, sacrifice and war - whereas the only conversation surrounding the Koons sculpture has to do with how much it will sell for. You can view Berman’s photo on the New York Times website.

It is remarkable that Nina Berman’s photograph and Jeff Koons’ sculpture exist in the same time frame, and that they are both meant to reflect the current state of American society. Berman’s Marine Wedding does so with weighty philosophical insight, while Koons’ Blue Diamond can’t even muster enough relevance to be called inconsequential.

Berman’s photo comes from a larger body of work she calls, Purple Hearts: Back from Iraq, which are compassionate studies of wounded Iraq war vets. Marine Wedding stands alone as a jarring image, with the great majority of images from Berman’s series being quite tame and contemplative by comparison. But Purple Hearts by no means represents the totality of Berman’s vision, and an overview of her growing body of work reveals an artist sincerely pursuing an honest examination of “the American Way of Life.” By comparison, even a cursory review of Koons’ oeuvre exposes an artist with all the sophistication of a corn dog.

Fundamental is an international touring art exhibition that explores the prickly subject of fundamentalist religious intolerance at the turn of the 21st century. I’m pleased to announce that my painting, A People Under Command: USA Today, is included in the exhibit, which tours four European cities from September 2007 until June 2008.

Fundamental will premiere at two venues in Manchester, England, starting September 1st, 2007 - the Zion Arts Center (running until Sept. 15th, 2007), and the Green Room (running until Sept. 22nd, 2007). The exhibit then travels to Madrid and Berlin, with a final stop in Leeds, England, where the exhibit concludes in 2008. Complete details regarding the exhibition can be found at the official Fundamental website.

Painted in 1985, A People Under Command: USA Today, was my wry comment on the rise in America of right-wing political ideology along with a resurgent, politicized Christian fundamentalism. The concept for the painting came to me while watching a born-again preacher on television performing a song about “God’s Army” and how true believers were “a people under command” lead by the ultimate general - Jesus Christ. Since I had always heard Jesus referred to as the “Prince of Peace,” I found the jingoistic psalm more than a little disturbing, especially when coupled with the rightward drift in American politics as exemplified by the administration of Ronald Reagan. My painting heralded the new dark ages - but little did I realize it would take on a frightening new dimension come the events of September 11th, 2001.

The didacticism of my painting notwithstanding, it may come as a surprise to learn that my artwork was in part inspired by a Pop Art masterwork. The stilted realism and irregular perspective I employed in depicting the presumably impossible scene, coupled with the fact that each visual component of the painting was derived from observing modern American life - points directly to Pop as a stimulus. In 1956 artists Richard Hamilton and John McHale collaborated on the creation of, Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing? - a small collage created with photos cut from popular American magazines of the day. It is generally considered to be the first work of Pop Art, and its skewed perspective and juxtaposition of discordant images provided an uneasy look at mass commercial culture. It was in essence, a glimpse of things to come… and the future wasn’t looking bright. Well, that future has arrived, and in creating A People Under Command, the collage of Hamilton and McHale served as a touchstone for my own vision of a culture gone haywire.

I believe there are many types of fundamentalist views running riot in the world today, for example, political, economic and national viewpoints are often reduced to fundamentalist positions. However, it’s religious fundamentalism that receives the most attention at present - though I’d argue all of these “isms” are interrelated. The organizers of Fundamental are billing their exhibit as “a timely glimpse into the disturbing world of global religious extremism”, and to their credit they’ve evenhandedly applied their focus on the extremists of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. It is no doubt a thorny concept to build an art exhibition around, especially in today’s climate - but the exhibit cannot in any way be characterized as a show opposed to religion.

Aside from myself, participating artists include: Debbie Hill (a photojournalist living in Israel), Frans Smeets (Dutch artist and sculptor), Parastou Forouhar (an Iranian-born artist residing in Germany), Khosrow Hassan (an Iranian artist based in Tehran), Dalila Hamdoun (a French-Algerian artist based in London), Garth Eager (an English multi-media artist based in Manchester), Andrew Stern (a photojournalist based in New York), Andreas Böhmig (German photojournalist), Joel Pelletier (US painter based in Los Angeles), and Johan Oldekop (a UK based photojournalist).

When pondering the above photograph of an artist painting a mural, what comes to mind? That the artist is playing a constructive role in society by creating a public work meant to beautify his community? Of course there are many possible reactions to the photo, but in describing the actual circumstances in which it was made, suddenly a different set of responses come into play - as well as questions regarding the social purposes of art. A closer examination of this photo can tell us something about the art and artists in our own respective communities.

The photo was taken on July 20, 2007 by Associated Press photographer, Khalid Mohammed, and it shows an Iraqi artist painting a mural on the steel and cement blast walls erected by U.S. occupation troops in downtown Baghdad, fortifications meant to protect government buildings from car bombs. Commissioned by the U.S. backed, Shiite dominated central government, the artist’s mural is part of a government funded “beautification project”, where non-controversial and colorful murals are being created and installed on bomb blast walls all across Baghdad. In painting the ramparts of a military occupation, does the Iraqi artist somehow make life better for his people? I don’t mean to say that art should not serve to ameliorate suffering and bring joy to the soul - those are, I believe, some of the main reasons why we create works of art. As Albert Camus once observed, “We have art in order not to die of life.” But when we create art, who is it for, what is its purpose, and what are its ramifications?

Knowing the context of the mural puts the artwork in a whole different light, and disconcerting questions arise that are pertinent for artists everywhere. Does the creative work most artists engage in simply conceal untenable realities? Should artworks make acceptable, that which is clearly unacceptable? At what point do the escapist elements of art move from enlightened pleasantries to enablers of malevolence? The spectacle of an artist embellishing an urban battlefield so as to mask the horrors of war is indeed a powerfully unsettling one, but is the work of that Iraqi muralist really so different from that of contemporary artists around the world? Sometimes I get the feeling that the majority of today’s artists, metaphorically speaking, are merely decorating blast walls.

As if to buttress my point, the postmodernist installation art duo, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, have announced plans to construct an enormous pyramid in the desert of the United Arab Emirates. The Mastaba project is named after the pre-pyramid, bunker-like tombs of ancient Egypt that served as final resting places for Kings and Queens, though it is not yet known if today’s Royal couple of postmodernism also intend their colossal mastaba to be their final burying place.

The pyramid will stand approximately two thirds the height of the Eiffel Tower, and will be constructed of 390,500 orange-yellow oil barrels; but don’t presume a pyramid built of oil barrels in the middle of the United Arab Emirates is some type of social commentary, it is not, after all this is Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who have been quoted as saying, “We do not create messages.” In the 1960’s the couple attempted to build their pyramid in Texas and then the Netherlands, however these plans didn’t work out. They finally turned to the UAE, but in 1980 the Iran-Iraq war erupted, a conflagration that took the lives of a million people and marked a deepening involvement in the region by the U.S. Needless to say, Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s art project was put on hold, and it wouldn’t be revived until just two years ago.

Washington aided both sides in the Iran-Iraq war, providing arms and intelligence information to the regimes of Saddam Hussein and Ayatollah Khomeini; of course that brinksmanship has only intensified, with the U.S. now occupying Iraq and threatening military action against Iran. With all this chaos as a backdrop, our postmodern dynamic duo have revived their pyramid project. The UAE “is very keen to see this project realized,” according to Christo, and the cost of building the pyramid will be underwritten by the government of the oil rich Gulf state. Contrasting with previous Christo projects, the structure will not be dismantled, and Christo has stated that the pyramid, according to unnamed engineers, “could last for 5,000 years.” But why is this harebrained project being embarked upon now, with the entire Middle East either on fire or about to explode? There is no ulterior motive or profound reasoning behind the return of the Mastaba project, because Christo and Jeanne-Claude, as apolitical and self-absorbed artists, are simply “decorating the blast walls.”

On the other hand, those artists who want their works to have a noble purpose, can fall into a trap of a different sort. In the Summer of 2005, British graffiti artist, Banksy, traveled to the West Bank to leave a series of stencil murals on Israel’s so-called “security fence” surrounding the Palestinian territories. On his website the artist wrote: “How illegal is it to vandalize a wall, if the wall itself has been deemed unlawful by the International Court of Justice? The Israeli government is building a wall which stands three times the height of the Berlin wall and will eventually run for over 700km - the distance from London to Zurich.” Once Banksy began his murals, he was confronted by an old Palestinian man who said, “You’ve painted the wall and made it look beautiful.” The artist replied with a “Thank you”, only to be admonished by the elder, “We don’t want it to be beautiful, we hate this wall. Go home!“

On Saturday, July 28th, 2007, I spoke at an artist’s forum celebrating the official Los Angeles debut of the newly published art book, Yo! What Happened to Peace? Held at the Continental Gallery in downtown L.A., the book premiere event was a lively evening of art, music and dialogue well attended by over 500 people.

As regular readers of this web log may know, Yo! What Happened to Peace? is an important traveling exhibition of hand-made prints created by over 120 artists in opposition to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Those unfamiliar with the project are encouraged to read about it in one of my previous posts. In June of 2005 when the exhibit of posters was presented in Tokyo, Japan, the Japan Times hailed the show as “The art that rocks the boat of war in Iraq.”

Joining me on the speakers podium were Chicano artists Chaz Bojorquez and Favianna Rodriguez - who both share with me the distinction of being included in the Yo! What Happened to Peace? traveling exhibit and book. Activist Susan Adelman of Code Pink and Eric Estenzo of Iraq Veterans Against The War completed the list of speaker’s. We provided critical dialogue regarding the current international political situation and the obligation of artists to respond to social issues. Acting as moderator for the forum was John Carr, curator of the “Yo!” exhibit.

Downtown LA’s own Hard Pressed Studios were on hand to create silk-screen printed peace images on demand, and the crowd loved the video performance art of VJ Michael Allen, who presented streams of projection based images on the gallery walls. Poster images from the exhibit were also projected onto the gallery’s large glass windows, providing a free light show to those on the street.

In decades to come people will look back at the “Yo!” traveling exhibition and book, and appreciate the project for its historic significance. It won’t be seen as the first such project of its kind, but that won’t lessen its importance. “Yo!” will be referred to as a vital collective response made by American artists against one of the worst debacles of the early 21st century.

Corporate advertising art and design without a doubt makes up much of the modern urban environment we move through on a daily basis. It has become so omnipresent that people barely notice it - inciting major advertising corporations to dream up new schemes for attention getting in an ever escalating battle over shaping public opinion. As a result, more than a few aggressively offensive and obnoxious visual campaigns have been inflicted upon us. One that comes to mind is the current ad promotion for L.A.’s local television “news” broadcaster, CBS 2 - KCAL 9. Now blanketing Los Angeles are hundreds of illuminated bus shelters and gigantic billboards that read: “CLEARLY- L.A.’s Dominant News Force.”

That the advertising company behind this jingoistic marketing blitz decided on martial language for its promotion is bad enough, but the ruthless slogan is coupled with a militaristic image that conjures up the brutality of war. No doubt the ad execs responsible for the campaign will stand behind the subterfuge that the image simply represents the CBS/KCAL fleet of helicopters flying over the city against a backdrop of L.A.’s ubiquitous palm trees, but look again, what’s that you see - Vietnam?

A quick glance at the official theatrical posters for the musical Miss Saigon, and the movie Apocalypse Now, tells you exactly what served as an inspiration for those ad execs behind the CBS/KCAL campaign, but honestly - someone should tell them that the U.S. lost the war in Vietnam. Or could it be that the CEO’s had the Iraq war in mind when they approved the billboard and bus shelter graphics? Perhaps they hoped that by equating the journalists of CBS/KCAL to U.S. soldiers in Iraq, some of that “support our troops” sentiment might rub off on their broadcast clients. Such an ugly and perverse display of venality coming from the commercial advertising world cannot be discounted.

[ CLEARLY: The Dominant Force? - US Army Blackhawk helicopters fly over occupied Baghdad, March 2007, in this now widely published photo taken by AFP photographer, Patrick Baz. ]

At any rate, whatever the impetus behind the CBS/KCAL ads might be, they are a picture perfect example of what I like to call, Totalitarian Postmodern, a dangerous aesthetic that threatens and undermines democratic values.

In 2004, Thomas Kinkade published reproductions of his painting, Heading Home, a schmaltzy and manipulative piece of classic war propaganda. But the title of Kinkade’s over-sentimental artwork is unhappily far from the truth, it should properly be titled - Shipping Out. With today’s U.S. military casualties in Iraq reaching 3,441 at the time of this article, and with the Pentagon secretly launching a second troop surge that will double the number of combat troops in Iraq this year - Heading Home seems little more than a cruel fantasy.

Nonetheless, Thomas Kinkade is not the only one suffering from delusions. Delivering a huge victory to Bush on May 24, the Democratic-controlled Congress approved $120 billion to fund Bush’s war, with Democrats abandoning their insistence on a timetable for the partial withdrawal of US troops in Iraq. This betrayal by the supposed opposition party not only guarantees that carnage in Iraq will continue for years to come, it ignores the will of the American people, who in the November 2006 congressional elections voted-in Democrats as a way of rejecting Bush’s Iraq war policies. As Keith Olbermann said on his MSNBC Countdown show, “The Democratic leadership has agreed to finance the deaths of Americans in a war that has only reduced the security of Americans.” He also asked, “Where are the Democratic presidential hopefuls.” No doubt they are in their respective homes or offices admiring their Thomas Kinkade prints.

This is the one and only time you’ll find a painting by Kinkade posted on my web log, and that’s because I simply wanted to illustrate my article with an image as ill-thought-out as the dim-witted politics behind the occupation of Iraq. On AmericaSupportsYou.mil, an official U.S. Department of Defense website, Kinkade said of his work: “The world I paint, I think it’s very affirming of the beliefs of people in this country and of the service people who are overseas waging a war to protect those beliefs.” An interesting statement, particularly in light of the latest polls conducted by FOX News, the Associated Press, CNN, USA Today and Gallup, all showing a majority of Americans in opposition to the war in Iraq. Without a doubt, Thomas Kinkade’s paintings are to art, what George Bush’s imperial fumblings are to statecraft.

This month, Saving Antiquities for Everyone (SAFE), a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving cultural heritage internationally, helped to organize a worldwide candlelight vigil to draw attention to the four year anniversary of the systematic looting and destruction of Iraq’s museums.

U.S. Marines seized Baghdad in the early days of April, 2003. While U.S. troops surrounded and protected Iraq’s National Ministry of Oil immediately after capturing Baghdad, they left numerous cultural institutions in the Iraqi capital completely unprotected from looters, who rampaged through the city like a devastating whirlwind. Iraq’s National Library was burned to the ground, destroying thousands of irreplaceable books and manuscripts. The ransacking of the Iraqi National Museum of Baghdad started on April 9th, 2003, and for three days a mob stole or shattered everything in sight. Over 15,000 irreplaceable works of art, many from the dawn of civilization, were stolen. Not a single U.S. military patrol attempted to stop the pillaging. The Bush administration’s response to the looting came from Donald Rumsfeld, who infamously said, “Stuff happens.”

After the devastation of the Second World War, the Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict was adopted in May, 1954. States agreeing to the Convention, promised to “safeguard and respect cultural property during both international and non-international armed conflicts.” As a signatory to the Convention, the U.S. failed miserably in its obligations to Iraq and world cultural heritage, and it continues to do so.

[ On Tuesday, April 10th, 2007, a crowd of brave Iraqis gathered outside the Iraq Museum in Baghdad, to hold a candlelight vigil for the museum. ]

In order to commemorate the destruction of Iraq’s museums, and to draw attention to the ongoing looting of that country’s archeological sites, SAFE called for candlelight vigils to take place internationally on April 10-12, 2007. Vigils were held in cities across the United States and the world, from Boston, Massachusetts, and San Francisco, California, to London, England, and Toronto, Canada. The most moving observance however took place amidst the violence of Baghdad at the sacked National Museum, where dozens of courageous employees and art lovers braved the mayhem to make their point.

Dr. Donny George Youkhanna was the Director of the National Museum at the time of its trashing, and in large part through his work, nearly half of the stolen Mesopotamian artworks have been recovered. However, George paid a price for his efforts. The Iraqi State Board of Antiquities came under the control of a Shiite party affiliated to Moktada al-Sadr, and George’s work was continually hindered and blocked. Aside from the difficulties of working with the U.S. backed government, the final straw came when George received a death threat letter aimed at his 17-year-old son. As a high-profile government official, a Christian, and a man seen frequently in western media, George had become a target to many of Iraq’s growing armed factions. In September of 2006 George resigned his position and fled with his family to Syria. Good fortune smiled on George when in the Fall of 2006, New York’s Stony Brook University appointed him a visiting professor in the university’s distinguished Anthropology department.

On the Saving Antiquities for Everyone website, you can read more about the international candlelight vigil, listen to a 38 minute interview with Donny George, and join SAFE in its endeavor to protect world cultural heritage.

Yo! What Happened to Peace?, is an exhibition of hand-made prints in opposition to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. The brainchild of L.A. based artist John Carr, the exhibit had its beginnings in 2002 during the run-up to war in Iraq. Being a printmaker, Carr wanted to put together a traveling exhibit that was not only a political expression, but a celebration of the fine art of printmaking. Instead of machine printed reproductions, the “Yo!” show consists entirely of handcrafted prints - Silkscreens, Lithographs, Linocuts, Woodcuts and Stencils. The collection is a striking example of contemporary political poster making, and I’m happy to have four of my early prints in the exhibition.

Past showings were held in Tokyo, San Francisco, New York, Milan, Rejkyavik, Washington D.C., Boston and Chicago. On April 14th, 2007, Yo! What Happened to Peace?, opened at the House of Love and Dissent in Rome, Italy. The opening was also the launch for the exceptional catalog book that documents the traveling exhibition. You can preview the Rome exhibit here, as well as view a number of prints from the exhibition and its catalog.

Edited by John Carr, the “Yo!” book features an introduction by punk art legend Winston Smith, a unique embossed stencil cover, and reproductions of the 220 plus handcrafted anti-war and pro-peace prints by some 120 artists that have come to define the touring poster exhibition. My own prints are included in the book, along with posters by Chaz Bojorquez, Robbie Conal, Eric Drooker, Emek, Shepard Fairey/OBEY, Poli Marichal, Favianna Rodriguez, Seth Tobocman and others too numerous to mention.

The Yo! What Happened to Peace? book will have its U.S. launch at the UCLA / L.A. Times Festival of Books at the Imix Books booth. The book fair takes place for two days starting April 28th, 2007 (hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.) , and will provide those interested with the opportunity to meet with John Carr, and hopefully a good number of the L.A. artists whose works appear in the art book. You can always purchase the book online for $25 US plus shipping (via credit card or paypal.)

I’m not sure just when the Los Angeles County Museum of Art acquired the services of the high-powered public relations firm of Hill and Knowlton, Inc. (H&K), but I first noticed the PR firm’s name included as a media contact on an official LACMA press release dated Feb. 3, 2006. The announcement was for the appointment of Michael Govan as the museum’s new Director and Chief Executive Officer (see the .pdf file.) When LACMA made known on March 6, 2007, that oil giant BP had given $25 million to the museum - LACMA’s official press release again included H&K as a media contact (.pdf file.)

[Update: LACMA has removed the above cited .pdf documents from their press release archive. However, one document from their online public records, the .pdf file titled LACMA Special Events, clearly lists Hill and Knowlton under the museum's "Partial Client List" on page four. The original Feb. 3., 2006 press release regarding Michael Govan having become director of LACMA was replaced with an updated bio on Sept. 30, 2010 which makes no mention of Govan having struck a $25 million funding deal with oil giant BP, nor of Govan agreeing to christen the newly constructed museum entry way, "The BP Grand Entrance."]

I have absolutely no objections to LACMA using a PR firm to effectively promote itself, nor would I criticize an individual for doing the same - but Hill and Knowlton, Inc. has a long and controversial roster of clients that I think readers of my web log should be aware of. A leading public relations corporation, H&K has 71 offices in 40 countries, with specialists in “crisis & issues management” as well as the oil and petrochemical industry. After reading some of the following, you may wonder what on earth has been going on behind closed doors at LACMA’s board of directors meetings.

Hill and Knowlton, Inc. became infamous over its dealings with the tobacco industry in the 1950s. In 2004 the U.S. Department of Justice finally sued the tobacco industry for $280 billion in damages, arguing that in 1953, the five major cigarette manufacturers met with “public relations firm Hill & Knowlton and agreed to jointly conduct a long term public relations campaign to counter the growing evidence linking smoking as a cause of serious diseases.” In August of 2006, a U.S. District Judge ruled that the tobacco companies had violated civil racketeering laws by conspiring for decades to deceive the public about the dangers of smoking - however, the judge did not order the monetary penalty proposed by the government (the case is currently being appealed.)

Lord of the lies; how Hill and Knowlton’s Robert Gray pulls Washington’s strings, written by Susan B. Trento and published by the Washington Monthly in Sept, 1992, detailed much of the PR firm’s skullduggery under the chairmanship of Gray. Trento wrote that for 30 years, Hill and Knowlton, “set a standard - not a particularly high one for what Washington lobbying can get away with (….) Whether the client was Haiti’s ‘Baby Doc’ Duvalier or the Church of Scientology, the only criterion was that the client paid - and paid well.” Sheila Tate, a former H&K employee and later Nancy Reagan’s press secretary, described the PR firm as a “company without a moral rudder” for its controversial client list.

The Center for Public Integrity published a 1992 report titled, The Torturers’ Lobby, describing the use of PR firms by repressive regimes (view in .pdf or html.) Hill and Knowlton, Inc. topped the list of earnings, making $14 million in one year by representing governments that abuse human rights like China, Indonesia, Egypt, Peru, and Turkey. Human Rights groups have long condemned Turkey for abusing its citizens of Kurdish origin, but the center’s report stated that H&K earned $1.2 million from Turkey between 1991-1992. H&K even took the Chinese government as a client soon after its massacre of dissidents at Tiananmen Square in 1989 (source: Human Rights in China website - .pdf.) In May of 2005, Agence France-Presse reported that H&K signed a $600,000 contract with the government of Uganda, to “improve Uganda’s stained reputation as a human rights abuser and democracy laggard.”

In December of 1984, a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, leaked 40 tons of lethal gas over the city, in what was to become the world’s worst industrial disaster. Some 8,000 people died in the first few days, and approximately 20,000 are believed to have perished in the aftermath. Today over 120,000 people in Bhopal continue to suffer health problems as a result of the disaster - blindness, cancer, serious birth-defects, and other ailments. A proper clean up of the plant and its environs has never taken place, and in Nov., 2004, the BBC reported that thousands of tons of toxic chemicals are still loose on the ground or held in open containers. Hill & Knowlton, Inc. handled Union Carbide’s PR troubles during the disaster, and H&K’s Executive Vice President, Richard C. Hyde, lead the “crisis management” team that assisted Union Carbide.

Hill & Knowlton, Inc. is currently the public relations firm for the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), the organization that represents the nuclear power industry. In a February 6th, 2006, Wall Street Journal article titled, Nuclear Industry Plans Ad Push For New Plants (Sub req’d), the paper reported that the “nation’s nuclear-power industry is set to roll out a multiyear advertising campaign to build public support for a generation of new plants” - and the ad campaign which promotes a “nuclear renaissance” is run by H&K. In a June 2006 editorial, the Columbia Journalism Review reported that the PR firm helped the NEI form the so-called “Clean and Safe Energy Coalition,” a front group that would sing the praises of nuclear energy for the corporate media. The Review wrote, “We just find it maddening that Hill & Knowlton, which has an $8 million account with the nuclear industry, should have such an easy time working the press.” That multi-million dollar contract stipulates “pre-empting and offsetting criticism from opponents.”

While we’re on the subject - when the Three-Mile Island nuclear plant in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, had a partial core meltdown on March 28th, 1979, it was Hill & Knowlton, Inc. executive, Robert Dilenschneider, who was brought in to handle PR for the plant’s operators, Metropolitan Edison.

Hill & Knowlton, Inc. is probably most notorious for its work with the government of Kuwait in organizing and running the propaganda campaign aimed at getting the U.S. public to support military action against Iraq. On August 2nd, 1990, Saddam Hussein began Iraq’s invasion and 7 month-long occupation of neighboring Kuwait. Within a few days the Iraqis had completely overrun the Kuwaiti Armed Forces, and with more than 100,000 Iraqi soldiers and 700 tanks on Kuwait’s territory, the Kuwaiti Royal Family escaped to next door Saudi Arabia.

From exile the Kuwaiti government would employ as many as 20 PR firms in its campaign to mobilize U.S. public opinion (source: O’Dwyer’s PR Services Report, Vol. 5, No. 1, Jan. 1991 - “H&K leads PR charge in behalf of Kuwaiti cause.”) But the Kuwaitis would ultimately pay $10.8 million to H&K for a massive media blitz. On October 10, 1990, H&K orchestrated the appearance of a 15-year-old Kuwaiti girl, identified only as Nayirah, before the Congressional Human Rights Caucus in Washington. The youngster wept as she told of her harrowing experience in occupied Kuwait City. “I volunteered at the al-Addan hospital. While I was there I saw the Iraqi soldiers come into the hospital with guns and go into the room where babies were in incubators. They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators, and left the babies on the cold floor to die.”

After Nayirah’s emotional testimony, President George H.W. Bush quoted her many times in addresses to the American people. For instance, at a Nov. 1st., 1990 Republican rally in Massachusetts, he said of the Iraqi invaders, “They have committed outrageous acts of barbarism. In one hospital, they pulled 22 premature babies from their incubators, sent the machines back to Baghdad, and all those little ones died.” At an Oct. 16th, 1990, fundraiser in Des Moines, Iowa, he said of the Iraqi occupiers, “I don’t mean to be overly shocking here - but let me just mention some reports, firsthand reports. At a hospital, Iraqi soldiers unplugged the oxygen to incubators supporting 22 premature babies. They all died. And then they shot the hospital employees.” A number of Senators also used Nayirah’s testimony in the same way, and the shocking story was repeated innumerable times in radio, television, and newspaper reports.

After the war, investigations found absolutely no evidence to support the incubator claims. As it turned out, Nayirah was a member of the Kuwaiti royal family, and her father was Kuwait’s Ambassador to the U.S., Saud Nasir Al-Sabah. The youngster never worked at the al-Addan hospital and under no circumstances had been witness to the butchery she recounted. Nayirah’s story was completely fabricated, and H&K’s vice-president Lauri Fitz-Pegado had coached the teenager in false testimony.

The record of Hill and Knowlton, Inc. as a dodgy and immoral PR firm is extensive, and itemizing their misconduct and crimes is beyond the scope of this web log. The facts I’ve researched and presented here are public knowledge - one can only imagine the skeletons in the closet. If you take the time to conduct your own research, you’ll find information on many other controversies surrounding H&K. In 1983 it managed PR for the building materials manufacturers, U.S. Gypsum, aimed at downplaying the connection between asbestos and health problems. The firm took an estimated $5 million from the National Conference of Catholic Bishops in 1990 to wage an anti-abortion PR campaign. In 2004 H&K began working with Wal-Mart in order to rehabilitate the image of the Union busting retail company. The larger question is, why did LACMA take into service a high-powered corporate PR firm so tainted with unseemliness?

Conceivably the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, in employing Hill and Knowlton, Inc. merely wanted to increase its profile with the general public. Or perhaps, realizing that their relationship with a major oil company would be seen as a liability, the vaunted arts institution decided to implement damage control - my suspicions point to the latter. What LACMA might be paying H&K for its services is not public knowledge, but the PR firm does not come cheap. Likewise, while it’s not known exactly what H&K is doing for LACMA, insiders in the lobbying and public relations industry have a saying, “the best PR is invisible.”

So the next time you’re exposed to a radio spot, television news segment, magazine article, or glowing press review extolling LACMA and its big oil benefactor, you might be consuming propaganda from hired guns Hill and Knowlton, Inc. When you read that Michael Govan, the director and CEO of LACMA, praised oil giant BP for “their commitment to sustainable energy,” you may have the feeling he was coached by the PR firm - and you just might be right.

A certain strain of contemporary art has examined, or taken inspiration from, the aesthetics and pulp visions of the American comic book - of course the Pop art movement and influential artists like Lichtenstein and Rauschenberg come to mind. Comics have also influenced American cinema, a trend I’m not terribly fond of, and the latest comic book to hit the silver screen is 300. Despite the hullabaloo over its eye-popping visual effects, 300 is indicative of nothing more than American movie making having hit rock bottom.

Based on Frank Miller’s graphic novel about the 300 Spartans who held back a million Persian soldiers at a narrow pass during the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C., Director Zack Snyder’s 300 has little to do with history and everything to do with a modern disposition towards militarism now embraced by far too many Americans. As you might imagine, 300 depicts the Spartans as gallant heroes, warriors who gave their all in the defense of the world’s first democracy - obviously the audience is meant to identify with the soldiers of Sparta. But the danger in such a simplistic reading of history is that Sparta, far from being a society worthy of emulation, was above all else a militaristic state, even the term “spartan” refers to something severely utilitarian - like a military barracks.

That the Greek press has ravaged 300 as a falsification of their nation’s history should come as no surprise (the film opened in Athens on March 9th). But why should Americans bother with what Greeks have to say about their own history, when we can learn all we need to know from a right-wing xenophobic American comic book artist born in Olney, Maryland.

Some of what Frank Miller said at San Francisco’s WonderCon comic book convention in 2006 bears repeating, as it puts the movie 300 in context. Miller revealed that his upcoming graphic novel, Holy Terror, Batman!, will feature the “Caped Crusader” fighting the al-Qaida terror network. Aside from promising that “Batman kicks al-Qaida’s ass,” Miller went on to say the following about his forthcoming graphic novel: “Not to put too fine a point on it - it’s a piece of propaganda. I just think it’s silly to have Batman out chasing the Riddler when you’ve got al-Qaida out there.” Miller went on to say that “I wish the entertainers of our time had the spine and the focus of the ones who faced down Hitler.” Apparently Miller thinks he is just such an entertainer.

300 is a testosterone fueled war fever-dream that offers a non-stop and ferocious display of disembowelments, spraying blood, and beheadings - and some film critics have unfortunately referred to this horrific violence as choreography or stylization. The unrelenting carnage in 300 is never connected to a sense of moral burden or remorse - it is simply what “real men” do. Compared to Flags of Our Fathers, Clint Eastwood’s insightful rumination on the genuine sacrifices and brutalities of war, 300 is an undisguised war enthusiast’s wet dream. When the film’s Spartan King Leonidas leads his army into battle yelling, “For Freedom!”, those words are meant to have a propagandistic effect upon its audience. Clearly, 300 is a brazen allegory for the war the U.S. is fighting in Iraq and preparing to fight in Iran.

That more than a few critics have referred to 300 as an “erotic” film is also telling. In Susan Sontag’s 1975 essay on fascist aesthetics, Fascinating Fascism, she stated that fascist art is: “both prurient and idealizing. A utopian aesthetics (physical perfection; identity as a biological given) implies an ideal eroticism: sexuality converted into the magnetism of leaders and the joy of followers. The fascist ideal is to transform sexual energy into a “spiritual” force, for the benefit of the community.” Sontag went on to note that fascism: “stands for an ideal or rather ideals that are persistent today under the other banners: the ideal of life as art, the cult of beauty, the fetishism of courage, the dissolution of alienation in ecstatic feelings of community; the repudiation of the intellect; the family of man (under the parenthood of leaders.)” - all of which appear larger than life in 300.

Following George W. Bush’s 2007 State of the Union address, National Public Radio broadcast, Writers and Artists Describe the State of the Union, a show where several guests had the opportunity to offer their assessments of national affairs - Frank Miller was one of those voices. Before insisting that Iraq had actually declared war on the U.S. - an assertion not even made by President Bush - Miller launched a fanatical tirade against a nameless, faceless, “other” he would like to see vanquished by American military force:

“For some reason, nobody seems to be talking about who we’re up against, and the sixth century barbarism that they actually represent. These people saw people’s heads off. They enslave women, they genitally mutilate their daughters, they do not behave by any cultural norms that are sensible to us. I’m speaking into a microphone that never could have been a product of their culture, and I’m living in a city where three thousand of my neighbors were killed by thieves of airplanes they never could have built.”

“They” are our implacable enemies, but truth, justice and the American way will free the world of “these people.” Now the real meaning behind the jingoistic tagline for 300 comes into sharp focus - Prepare for glory!

I know that public memorials to a nation’s war dead are usually erected after a conflict, but lately I’ve been thinking that it’s time for American artists to begin seriously contemplating what an Iraq War Memorial might look like. As of this writing, 3,154 American soldiers have lost their lives in Iraq.

Years ago I visited the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington D.C., that uncomplicated wall of granite designed by artist Maya Lin. I stoically encountered the over 58,000 thousand names engraved upon the reflective walls, but when I saw two young women standing on their tip toes, trying unsuccessfully to make a rubbing of a loved one’s name that appeared just beyond their reach - I fell apart. I wordlessly strode up to the pair, took their pencil and paper, and being much taller, made the rubbing for them. Apart from the women pointing out the name of the dearly departed, the entire incident took place in silence. As the women took their sacred memento in hand and disappeared into the crowd, my entire body shook as I began to cry uncontrollably. I can’t begin to describe what I felt at that moment, all I know is that Lin’s memorial has become hallowed ground, a profound site for national remembrance that mirrors the scar in our national psyche.

A future Iraq War Memorial must convey that same intensity. But the conundrum is, how do we build a monument to the biggest foreign policy disaster in American history? As I was contemplating this and more, I received an e-mail from Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Foundation, announcing their web project - the Iraq Veterans Memorial. They are asking family members, loved ones, veterans and significant others, to submit a one-minute video remembrance of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq. On March 19th, 2007, the fourth anniversary of the U.S. invasion, the compiled video statements will be published online. Organizers of the Iraq Veterans Memorial are hoping that thousands of people will link to this moving video statement, or commit to hosting the memorial on their own web sites and blogs. The following statement on the March 19th unveiling, comes from the organizers of the Iraq Veterans Memorial:

“Around the country people have been looking for ways to mark this tragic date. Inspired by the AIDS Quilt, the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, and the New York Times biographies of the 9/11 victims, Brave New Films and Robert Greenwald decided to create a living, online memorial to U.S. soldiers who have been killed in the past four years. The Iraq War Memorial will bear witness with 60 one-minute video remembrances of family, friends, co-workers, and military colleagues of those who have died and how much they will be missed. Non-partisan, with no pundits or commentary, the Memorial will be a tapestry of personal memories and anecdotes which will always remind us of the impact the lost soldiers had on those who loved them. The memorial will be unveiled on March 18th and 19th all across the internet. It will be easily accessible on iraqmemorial.org.

Our Brave New Foundation, in partnership with Gold Star Families Speak Out, Military Families Speak Out, Iraq Veterans Against the War, and numerous other anti-war groups, is in the midst of producing the videos and figuring out how the Memorial can have the biggest impact. We would love your help in getting people around the country involved in finding ways, and places to have the memorial seen. We are encouraging people to “unveil the Memorial,” to view it at various public places, schools, churches, bookstores, libraries, galleries, union halls, and cafes. Some artist/activists are going to project the Memorial on the side of buildings. If you have any other ideas or people we should contact, please let us know right away. iraqmemorial.org.”

Wack! Art and the Feminist Revolution, opens March 4th, 2007 at the Geffen Contemporary of the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, and runs until July 16th, 2007. Organized by MOCA curator Connie Butler, the show features artworks created from 1965 to 1980, by 100 women focused on the status and liberation of women. In one attempt to capture the militant spirit of late 60’s feminist groups, Butler named her show, Wack!, which is not itself an acronym, but alludes to the popularity of acronyms used by radical groups of the period, my favorite example being the tongue in cheek, W.I.T.C.H., or - Women’s International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell.

Wack! is being promoted as “the first comprehensive, historical exhibition of feminist art”, and you could add “international” to the billing as around half of the artists are from outside the U.S. - including artists from England, Poland, Scandinavia, Germany, Algeria, India, Canada, Italy, Chile, and Brazil. Many talents - well known and unknown - are in the show, and an excellent illustrated catalog published by MOCA covers all the bases, however, in this article I’d like to focus on just one participating artist - Martha Rosler.

During the early 1970’s I discovered Rosler’s photomontage series, Bringing the War Home: House Beautiful, a brilliant, multi-faceted, intrinsically feminist critique of American involvement in Vietnam. The title of Rosler’s collection was a melding of a popular 60’s antiwar slogan in the U.S. (”Bring the War Home!”), to the vapid women’s magazine of the period that promoted homemaking as the proper area of interest for women. Rosler’s compelling and influential photomontage works seem more powerful than ever - especially since we are mired in a new Vietnam. I was delighted to learn that Rosler’s works were recently included in Media Burn, an exhibition at London’s Tate Modern, and even more excited to discover that she’s rekindled the Bringing the War Home: House Beautiful series - this latest edition being focused on Iraq.

Red Stripe Kitchen was a photomontage from the original 1962 - 72 series. In it, Rosler combined two photos to startling effect. The first, a circa 1970 interior shot of an affluent household’s modern home kitchen, decorated in the fashionable modernist style; gleaming white from floor to ceiling, with a breakfast bar seating arrangement surrounding the stove. Adjacent doors lead to a pantry. The dazzling white is interrupted by red highlights found in dishes, appliances - and a decorative stripe painted mid-level on the pantry wall. The second photo spliced into this tranquil scene explodes the myth of domestic bliss. Two combat ready Marines are snooping around in the pantry, engaged in the same type of search performed by U.S. soldiers a million times over in Vietnamese villages suspected of aiding Viet Cong guerillas. Aside from exposing the kitchen as a battlefield, Rosler’s photomontage directly linked women’s oppression to militarism and overseas imperial adventures - but it also posed a thousand questions. Who is the enemy? Who is innocent? Who shall be absolved of guilt and responsibility in times of war?

In Gladiators, one of Rosler’s current works from the Iraq series, the bourgeois home has not only turned out to be invaded, its interior has become inseparable from the mayhem outside its walls. In the living room of the spacious home depicted, a framed artwork hangs; a photo of bloodied Iraqi civilians heaped in a pile, a crystal-clear indication that we are living with the war in our daily lives without really seeing it. The quiet of the affluent residence has been shattered by a police officer, who is apparently arresting a member of the household while heavily armed U.S. soldiers conduct a search and destroy mission through the dwelling. That one of the soldiers is raising his automatic weapon towards the viewer is a disquieting reminder that the war has indeed - come home.

Viewers of Gladiators may be confused by the chaotic panorama glimpsed through the abode’s huge bay windows. In part it is obviously a distressing Iraqi street scene where smoke from a detonated car bomb wafts by palm trees, but who are the odd looking men rushing the house as they brandish clubs? The photograph depicting them is not a readily identifiable image, even though it’s an Associated Press photo that was widely circulated on the internet. The image documents U.S. Marines of the 1st Division in Iraq, dressed as gladiators and - like a scene from Charlton Heston’s, Ben Hur - holding chariot races with filched Iraqi horses. The bizarre incident occurred at a Marine military base outside of the doomed city of Fallujah on November 6th, 2004, the very eve of the Marine attack that would destroy the “insurgent stronghold” of 300,000 civilians. If you find this all too hard to believe, you can see the original AP photos here, as well as read Agence France-Presse’s account of the Marine’s evangelical pre-Fallujah pep rally.

The Geffen Contemporary of the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, is located in downtown Los Angeles near Little Tokyo, at 152 North Central Avenue. LA, CA. 90013. Visit them on the web, at: www.moca.org. MOCA has also constructed a special website for the exhibition, a “collaborative environment for consciousness-raising and discussion.” At MOCA’s WACK! site, “the general public, artists, and authors can participate in the discourse by posting responses to artworks.”

Americans for the Arts is a leading nonprofit organization that advances the arts in the United States. With offices in Washington, DC, and New York City, it has a record of more than 45 years of service. On February 5, 2007, Americans for the Arts President and CEO Robert L. Lynch, responded to the Bush administration’s fiscal year 2008 Arts and Culture funding recommendations by issuing the following statement:

“For the first time in three years, President Bush initiated a proposed increase in funds for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). If approved, the president’s $4 million funding increase would grow the NEA budget from $124.4 million to $128.4 million, which is a step in the right direction. However, Americans for the Arts calls on Congress to restore full funding to the NEA at its fiscal year 1992 level of $176 million, which spurred significant economic growth, artistic achievement, and accessibility to the nation’s cultural organizations across the nation. The nonprofit arts industry generates $134 billion in economic activity annually for the U.S. economy, supports 4.85 million full-time jobs, and returns $10.5 billion in income tax revenue back to the federal government.

We applaud the president for recommending another significant increase to the Institute of Museum and Library Services and a modest increase to the National Endowment for the Humanities. However, it is disappointing to see the administration propose zeroing out funding for the seventh consecutive year to the Department of Education’s arts education programs. One of the best ways to nurture creativity, a necessity to prepare for a 21st-century workforce, is to have children learn and actively participate in the arts. The administration needs to understand the role of arts education in developing an innovative and creative society. Studies show that students who participate in the arts are not only more likely to participate in a math and science fair, but also outperform their peers on the SATs by 103 points.”

Let me put the issue of federal arts funding in perspective for you.

President Bush’s 2008 fiscal request for the National Endowment for the Arts is $128.4 million. The President’s 2008 fiscal request for defense and the “global war on terror” is $716 billion. The war and occupation in Iraq has so far cost an estimated $365 billion.

According to a report by the Los Angeles Times, “Currently, the Defense Department says it is spending about $4.5 billion a month on the conflict in Iraq, or about $100,000 per minute. Current spending in Afghanistan is about $800 million a month, or about $18,000 per minute.

$128 million for an entire year’s worth of national arts funding - yeah, we’re doing exceptionally well here folks.

Shams (Arabic for “Sun”) is a popular female Kuwaiti singer who has just released a controversial song titled, Ahlan Ezayak (or “Hi! How are you!”) Accompanied by a slick MTV-like video that lambastes George W. Bush and his occupation of Iraq, the song has become all the rage in the Middle East. Shams croons in the Khaliji style, one of the most intoxicating and seductive genres in pop music today, and yet most Americans have not heard of it - even as U.S. soldiers sink ever deeper into Arab sands. Clearly, it’s time for what The Clash used to call, “a public service announcement - with guitar!” Well o.k., make that “with oud.”

[ Shams & George, an impossible affair. All screen captures from Shams’ video, Ahlan Ezayak - or "Hi! How are you!" ]

“This child, as you can see is neither beautiful, spoilt, nor even well-fed. He is barefoot like many children in refugee camps. He is actually ugly and no woman would wish to have a child like him. However, those who came to know ‘Hanzala’, as I discovered and later adopted him because he is affectionate, honest, outspoken, and a bum. He is an icon that stands to watch me from slipping. And his hands behind his back are a symbol of rejection of all the present negative tides in our region.”

The implications in the emotional ending of Shams’ video are clear. She has turned her back on all of the “present negative tides” to marry Hanzala, who it turns out, is not the physically stunted and victimized child we see - but a sagacious and heroic spirit as old as the “refugee problem” itself. Shams has married the resistance. If you want to know what Arabs are thinking and how Arab artists are responding to the conflagration in their neighborhood, turn off FOX and NPR, toss out your dog-eared copy of Newsweek - and watch this video.

[ You can read more about Shams and her notorious song at the Common Dreams website, and at Juan Cole’s Informed Comment blog.]